A Newbies Guide to Franklin BBQ

I am always a fan of doing things to celebrate birthdays. Life has been crazy lately, so for Cody’s 27th, I planned a trip to Austin for a short get away. Austin is our go to date day place because there is SO much to do!

I booked the airbnb back in February, two months before his birthday. Go me! I didn’t really know what we would do other than eat at the infamous Franklin’s BBQ as that has been on my “Austin Bucket List” for over a year.

Sunday afternoon arrived and it was time for our mini get-away. We loaded up the car and headed to Austin. Oh, it is also important to note that we took off Monday.

If you know anything about Franklin BBQ you know that it has infamously long lines that you must wait in for two-three hours before ordering. I am not a fan of waiting in line, so we drove up Sunday afternoon to spend the day in Austin. The plan was to wake up early Monday morning and go wait in line for the BBQ. Monday is the first day of a work week, tourist have gone back home. This was a genius plan in my opinion.

We made it to our airbnb that smelt of mold + cheap air freshner. It was great.

Actually…it was really cute, minus the smell.

Fun Things to do in Austin

We started our afternoon in Austin with a trip to Allen’s Boots on South Congress.

Side note: I have been wanting a new pair of boots for forever and decided that the best way to get said boots was to buy them for my wedding so that they go under the “wedding budget” that mom and dad are takin’ care of! 😉

A stop at Allen’s was the first thing on the agenda. Not sure if it was pure luck or what, but we slipped in about thirty minutes before they closed and FOUND MY BOOTS! Praise Jesus, hallelujah!

We walked around South Congress for a little while. I tried to get him to take a picture with me at the “I love you so much” sign at Jo’s, but he said that was dumb. You’re dumb, CODY!

Then we made our way to a local restaurant we have been wanting to eat at since I lived in Austin two years ago. Moonshine Grill was the perfect spot to celebrate his birthday dinner.

While we were waiting on a table, I sat down in the bar and this nice old man asked me to move so that his group of eight could fit at the table I was sitting at. He was really nice about it, but his friend said that was rude and told me to put my next round of drinks on their tab. I laughed awkwardly (because hello, I’m Kelly…) and found Cody before moving to the outdoor bar. Flash forward an hour or so and guess who gets seated at the table RIGHT next to us? None other than the old man and his group of eight followers. We did in fact get that round of drinks!

I ordered the green chili macaroni and Cody ordered the chicken and waffles. All wedding diets were off tonight!

I was not super impressed with my meal and I told “old man” when he asked our opinions on the food we ordered. He then told our waiter, which got us a free dessert!

We went to this cute little East Austin bar afterwards. We knew it was East Austin because we overheard them talking about aquapod farming…or something super crunchy like that. And because the waitress looked at us and smelled “not a hipster” and immediately acted really smug towards us, but hey…that’s Austin! (Also, I LOVE Austin. I’m just not very hipster-y.)

Monday morning we woke up at like 7:30. On his birthday. All in the name for BBQ! We loaded the car, filled the cooler with snacks and beer and water. Oh, and our dessert from the night before.

We were out the door by 8:15. The plan was to drive by, assess the line, then get some coffee and begin our morning in line.

Well… we got there. And this is what we saw….

I realize that is hard to read…Let me transcribe it for you.

“Sorry y’all. We’re closed on Monday’s”

Yup. Franklin’s is closed on Mondays. In all my planning and great ideas I failed to even check that the stinkin’ place was open! Happy Birthday Cody!

So…plan B.

We found a small coffee shop right down the road, Blue Dahlia Bistro. It had this adorable outdoor seating area. No one was there, so we claimed the back all to ourselves. We got some coffee and bread (again, wedding diet is off). We sat, talked, watched the coffee shop cat, and sipped our coffee.

It was a good Monday morning.

Yelp came in and saved the day by giving us a slew of other BBQ restaurants we could eat at that WERE open on a Monday We settled on Lamberts.

It was no Franklin’s, but it worked. It was also really overpriced. And I’m pretty sure the couple sitting next to us was having a lunch date with a person that was not his or her spouse. So that was interesting.